He straightened almost imperceptibly in his seat, as impulse suddenly bade him fling himself forward upon Crang. Why not? The sound of a revolver shot would be heard in the street, and Crang might not even dare to fire at all. And then John Bruce's glance rested on the man beside him--and impulse gave way to common sense. He had no intention of submitting tamely and without a struggle to any fate, no matter what it might be, that Crang proposed for him, but that struggle would better come when there was at least a chance. There was no chance here. Birdie, on the seat beside him, held a deadlier and even more effective weapon than was Crang's revolver, a silent thing--a black-jack. “Wait! Don't play the fool! You'll get a better chance than this!” the voice of what he took to be common sense whispered to him. The car began to go slower. It swerved twice as though making sharp turns; and then, running still more slowly, began to bump over rough ground. Crang spoke again. “You can make all the noise you want to, if you think it will do you any good,” he said viciously; “but if you make a move you are not told to make you'll be _carried_ the rest of the way! Understand?” John Bruce did not answer. The car stopped. Birdie opened the door on his side, and stepped to the ground. He was joined by the man who had driven the car, and who, as John Bruce now found he had correctly assumed, had acted as the decoy at the gambling house. “Get out!” ordered Doctor Crang curtly. John Bruce followed Birdie from the car. It was dark out here, exceedingly dark, but he could make out that the car had been driven into a narrow lane, and that they were close to the wall of a building of some sort. The two men gripped him by his arms. He felt the muzzle of Crang's revolver pressed into the small of his back. “Mind your step!” cautioned Birdie gruffly. It was evidently the entrance to a cellar. John Bruce found himself descending a few short steps; and then, on the level again, he was guided forward through what was now pitch blackness. A moment more and they had halted, but not before John Bruce's foot had come into contact with a wall or partition of some kind in front of him. One of the men who gripped his arms knocked twice with three short raps in quick succession. A door opened in front of them, and for an instant John Bruce was blinded by a sudden glare of light; but the next instant, his eyes grown accustomed to the transition, he saw before him a large basement room, disreputable and filthy in appearance, where half a dozen men sat at tables drinking and playing cards.